Occasional musings on a variety of things.

You Are Being Drowned

Christopher Hitchens has changed his tune on whether or not waterboarding is torture – after trying it out for himself.

As if detecting my misery and shame, one of my interrogators comfortingly said, â€œAny time is a long time when youâ€™re breathing water.â€ I could have hugged him for saying so, and just then I was hit with a ghastly sense of the sadomasochistic dimension that underlies the relationship between the torturer and the tortured. I apply the Abraham Lincoln test for moral casuistry: â€œIf slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.â€ Well, then, if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture.